


The Fixer

by Oleanders_One



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Gen, Parody, harlots, unexploded chantries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 06:02:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29853660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oleanders_One/pseuds/Oleanders_One
Summary: What challenge is there left in the late 21st century, now that droids perform society's dangerous jobs, and what is left of the wilderness has been sanitized and Disnefied for safety and nonthreatening enjoyment? Westworld? Jurassic Park? Yesterday's news. Come to Thedas World! It's a Hell ... of a good time.
Kudos: 2





	The Fixer

"The strangest request? Well, that's a subject for debate." Mother Maybel grinned at the young reporter as she laid out the first card of her Tarot reading. _Just give them entertaining bits of nothing,_ she had been told by Corporate, _you know the drill. Giant swords and lots of tiddies; the padloids eat that up._ Corporate invariably assigned the reporters to Mab; the same patter she used with potential investors worked flawlessly with the journalist from World News Now. "We will, of course, try to accommodate requests, whenever practical. One returning guest wanted nothing but dogs for companions; Dog, Dogistair, Doghren."

The reporter obligingly scrunched her face and cooed. "Oh, that's adorable!"

"But quite impossible. Wardens, Inc employs every one of the few hundred purebred mabari in existence. They are actors, and earn scale for their talents. Why would they choose to pay for the dubious pleasure of playing Companion in some spoiled rich girl's version of the story? She had little outfits, for gods' sake."

The young woman's face fell, then brightened slightly as Mab continued the reading.

_The Chariot: control, action, determination. The Arishok in armor, huge spear held aloft, pulled by a pair of wild, red-eyed harts. That new The Iron Bull over at the Par Vollen pavilion, though, what was his name? Such nice hands. Maybe he has a spot open tomorrow._

"My, you did want this story, didn't you, dear. What would your mother say?" Mab shook her head and tsked. "Are Kurt and Jayde still marooned on Easter Island, reporting on rocks?"

"What? I didn't, I mean..." The girl flushed to the roots of her hair. "Y-yes, but I—oo, The Lovers!"

Mab shifted her attention to the card she had just placed. "Oh, I'm sorry, dear. But you're better off without him, I'm sure."

"What?!"

Mab smiled gently as she tapped the reversed card. "He was the one who dented your father's urn, you know. He blamed the dog, but it was him."

The reporter slammed her hand down on the table, wincing slightly. "That creep! But how did you know my boyfriend moved out?" _Wait for it._ "How did you know about the urn? How do you know these things?!"

"Why, it's all here in the cards, dear." _That and the tiny surveillance drones I dispatched last week._

The next several cards of the carefully stacked deck were purposefully bland; a hint at a promotion here, a veiled reference to an attractive woman on the commuter pod there. Mab hadn't read from a shuffled deck in her life, and she had no intention of starting anytime soon. It was child's play to switch decks with all of the lovely distractions an evening at the Pearl provided, and she was as deft at it as she was with, well, other things. "The Knight of Pentacles." Here, predictably, represented by the Arl of Redcliffe.

"Oo, it's Arl Eamon!" the reporter trilled.

Ah. _One of those._ Mab herself couldn't stand the Arl; either the character or the oh-so-serious method actors who invariably chose the role. She wasn't about to re-ignite the Guerrin Debates in the Pearl tonight, though; it was bad for business, and gave her a sour stomach.

"And last … oh, no. Oh, my dear." Mab laid the flaming Tower, complete with tiny purple dragon clinging to the crenellations, on the table.

"What's so bad about a tower? It's not like it's the Death card or anything."

"Oh no, no. Death represents change, or a transition. The Tower … well, it brings upheaval and chaos. I have a dreadful fear for your safety in the park, my dear. Perhaps we should reschedule your visit."

The girl paled, then rallied, just as Mab knew she would. These young, hustling reporters were all of a type. Each one was certain that it would be them who finally cracked the story of Thedas World wide open. They wouldn't be like all of the others come before, running home with useless shreds of a story, their crystal-clear memories turned murky and confusing, serving only to fan the flames of mystery surrounding the park. Not them. "No, absolutely not. Who believes in fortune-telling in 2083, anyway?". Her eyes darted from side to side, then back to Mab. "It's just …"

"Oh, old Mother Maybel is just having a laugh with you, sweetie. It's just harmless fun, nothing real or legally binding, certainly not." She smiled, showing all of her teeth. She'd been told once that it made her appear vaguely shark-like. Mab rather liked that.

The reporter tittered nervously. "Of—of course. All just p-part of the atmosphere." She looked about the room, seeming to realize exactly where she was at last. "This is a brothel!"

Mab laughed. "Of course it is, honey. Did you believe all of these lovelies to be nothing but window-dressing for Mother Maybel's Tarot Tearoom?"

"Sort o-of course not. It's only … it just seems a bit odd to find an ol—a lady of your—I mean, a woman like you, here, who does nothing but knit and read tarot."

"And why would you think that, dear?"

"What I mean is, you don't serve drinks, and you don't …" The girl wiggled her fingers at the couple walking hand-in-hand towards the cordoned-off back hallway.

"Believe me, child, I am paid to wiggle much more than my fingers." Mab snickered.

"But … I. But—"

"But I'm old, aren't I, dear? Old and wrinkled and used up, and I probably smell like cats and dusty food stamps, and who in their right mind would want to see a naked, ancient, un-Revivified body like mine? Isn't that right, dear?" Not that Mab had anything against the scores of anti-aging bots running around inside her; she always bought the top-of-the-line from the best chirurgeon in New Miami, and felt better at eighty than she had at twenty. But the sheer freedom of age, without the aches and bad knees? She wouldn't go back to her thirties, even if in appearance only, if they paid her.

"What are food stamps?"

 _What do they teach these idiots in History these days?_ "The point, dear, is that I'm the third highest-paid sex worker at the Pearl. Haven't you ever heard of a GILF, sweetie?"

"A—"

Mab sighed. "Think about it, dearie. Now, then." She stood and led the reporter through the dimly-lit hallways to a locked and heavily guarded back door, ignoring the squeals and assorted grunts issuing from the rooms. "Are you ready to see the park?"

~~~~~

Mother Maybel slowed the pod to a halt, hovering shielded and invisible over the unexploded Temple of Sacred Ashes outside Haven in Originsland.

"Are those qunari?" The reporter pointed at the group of large men and women jogging up the mountain path from the chantry with all of the economy and precision of a military unit.

"Technically, they are still human, though they've been enhanced to the point that the term isn't really descriptive. We needed so many qunari actors for our most recent addition to Inquisitionland that we had to fly in chirurgeons from the Soviet Reunion and Europe. I'm not sure what they're doing in Haven, though."

"Hold on, I'm getting an alert." Mab listened, then pressed behind her ear to turn up the mic on the implant. "Got it, on my way." She turned to the reporter.

"Change of plans. Are you up for a side trip to help Big Cheese?"

"Is that another Alistair joke?" The girl frowned.

It had been made clear to Mab who the reporter was truly hoping to catch sight of on their tour of the park, and it wasn't a shriveled-up old harlot-cum-fixer. _I should write that one down._ It didn't even matter that, as a Companion, each Alistair was a paying customer, not an actor, and wholly distinct from every other Alistair there had ever been.

Apart from the basic park rules that the player filling the Alistair role must fit naturally into the general appearance, or be modified to appear so, and follow the basic story guidelines implicit in the role, they were hypothetically as different from one another as chance allowed. In practice, all of the Alistairs Mab had ever met were so much of a type as to be virtually indistinguishable. Young people, rich enough to afford the very best in extravagant entertainment options and idle enough to spend the better part of a month in their pursuit. A little brawn-over-brains, but that didn't last long in the crucible of Originsland.

Out from under their parents' thumbs for likely the first time in their lives, they changed, forgot their money, forgot their cynicism, and almost to a person, fell deeply in love. Some left heartbroken, some with a new love and a new purpose, some were sent home cargo.

"Big Cheese is actually Loghain's callsign, as theirs is arguably the most pivotal role save the Warden's. One of the groups just triggered the Landsmeet, and one of the actors on scene, Arl Wolff, signaled for assistance. This shouldn't take long," Mab said as she turned the pod towards Denerim. "Probably an Angsty Alistair or Wonder Warden."

To her credit, the young reporter didn't take the obvious Alistair bait. "A Wonder Warden? What's that?"

"The Warden is the role that allows a player the most freedom of choice. Unlike the Companions, the Warden can choose one of several backgrounds, doesn't have a suggested personality template, and makes most of the significant decisions in their role-playing group's journey through the story. This latitude can lead some to get a bit big for their britches."

"Note: look up 'britches'," the girl whispered into her palm recorder, while surreptitiously trying to angle her head to get the best footage on her lenscam.

Mab ignored both the question and the recording device; they'd deal with the vid before the reporter left the park. The reporter's padloid publisher would threaten legal action, of course, they always did. But the contracts drawn up that allowed entry specifically forbade all image recording devices, which left the publishers without a proverbial leg to stand on. Despite the contract language, there wasn't an observer or reporter yet who hadn't tried to smuggle out illegal footage. "Anyway. If you know the story, the Landsmeet is typically where shit meets fan."

"What's a—"

"There is a very difficult choice for the Warden to make, and one of the choices can lead them to become Anora's consort. Being the Consort, though, isn't always good enough for some Wardens, and they demand the Crown itself. As if slicing up darkspawn droids or finding some magic pixie dust makes them fit to be a monarch."

"What do you do in that case?"

Mother Maybel gazed at the girl over her half-glasses. "I fix it."

~~~~~

Mab set a bruising pace on their way to the Landsmeet chamber, leaving the reporter half-running to keep up, while still struggling with her devices. They met Ser Cauthrien just outside.

"Mab, thank goodness. Grand Cleric Elemena is nowhere to be found, so we've got a deadlocked Landsmeet, a possible Angsty Alistair, and I can't raise Corporate."

"So just what is a—"

"What do you mean, you can't raise Corporate?" She keyed her mic, to find it dead. She thought for a moment, then started to strip. "Fine. Fetch me the backup GC get-up," she barked, and Cauthrien ran off.

"What is an Angsty Alistair?" The reporter tried again.

Mab started to re-braid her hair, and spoke around the pins clenched in her teeth. "Depending upon the Wardens choices, Alistair may be called upon to fight Teyrn Loghain, then execute them. Most of our Alistairs are highly motivated, but some … some have a crisis of conscience, or develop an infatuation with them."

"Loghain is a traitor and a murderer. They're the bad guy!"

Mab met Cauthien's amused gaze as she arrived with the backup robes. "There are, to put it mildly, as many opinions on the Loghain character as there are on Alistair or Morrigan." Mab finished with her hair, tugging the side braids down over her pointed ears.

Cauthrien gave the cub reporter a sour look as she helped Mab with the robe. "Don't journalists bother to read anymore? There are dozens of essays and two novelizations of their life. One former Loghain wrote a one-person play: 'Against The Tide'."

The girl wilted under the stony gaze of the warrior, but again, to Mab's surprise, seemed to rally. "I'd think that the Warden and the Companions would be so used to killing darkspawn by the time of the Landsmeet, that one more death would hardly phase them?"

"It's different, because Loghain is a possible Companion, and thus a player – a paying customer." She fastened the heavy golden chest piece in place, and Cauthrien settled the stole on her shoulders. Mab straightened, assuming a bearing appropriate for the head of the chantry in Ferelden. "Players have whatever protections they come with, and the level of healthcare that the package they purchase guarantees them. They have none of the elaborate safeties we afford our actors."

"You mean players can be hurt permanently?" A look of dawning horror crossed her face. _Took her long enough._ "Players can die?" she demanded.

Mab spared her a withering glance. "Obviously." Had the girl not done the barest amount of research? Thedas World was the bloodiest adventure park on the planet. In deaths per attempt, it made summiting Everest seem as dangerous as a child's slide. "Now sit down, shut up, and wait for me. If you move, Cauthrien will run you through."

~~~~~

 _That's strange._ Neither Cauthrien nor the cub reporter were in the antechamber when Mab had finished and changed. It was empty. She keyed the mic behind her ear. "Corporate? Anyone feel like answering yet?"

"Wardens, Inc has been assimilated. You are now an employee of Ataashi Enterprises. Ataash Qunari!" Mab was grabbed roughly from behind and forced to her knees, held effortlessly by grey hands the size of trash can lids. An enormous, bare-chested qunari strode into the room, a qunari she recognized.

"Arishok! What the hell do y—" Another grey hand clamped across her face and nose, cutting off her breathing. She struggled feebly against hands that might as well have been cut from granite.

"You are _bas,_ you will be tested. _Bas_ who prove their worth will find their place in the Qun; the unworthy shall be repurposed."

 _This was someone's extremely poor joke. When Mab caught up with whoever it was, they'd be busted down to Assistant Bronto Scent Gland Expresser._ The edges of her vision darkened, the Arishok's words following her into blackness. _You will be tested._

~~~~~

Mab woke to a blinding headache, a loud tenor barking orders, and rough hands shaking her out of semi-consciousness. Her trained eye took in the rustic furnishings, threadbare blankets, and plain servant's shift in a fraction of a second. _The alienage._

A qunari bent over Mab, thier massive shoulders brushing both walls of the tiny sleeping cubicle. "The female will begin her testing. She has been chosen for procreation by the Tamassrans, and will proceed to the place of mating now. _Asit tal-eb."_

 _Stall them. "Shanedan,_ Shianni." She looked over the room again; no weapons, nothing to use as a possible distraction apart from the pillow under her head. _I've done with less._ "I would petition the Tamassrans for a … a stay of mating, in view of my age."

A bass voice rumbled from the main room. _"Maraas imekari._ If the _bas_ wishes to forfeit the test, she will be taken to the mines."

 _That was blunt enough. "Kost,_ Father. I will comply." The honorific didn't really apply to a qunari Cyrion, but the irritable grumbling from the other room subsided.

Mab took as much time as she dared changing into the wedding dress, as plans, contingency plans, and contingencies for the contingencies took shape in her mind. She knew the story and the choices better than anyone who was likely still alive. She'd survive the story. She'd survive the Blight. She'd survive to see each and every one of the qunari pay.

She thought she might rather enjoy it.


End file.
